mattbenfield wrote:QUESTIONS FOR KINDLE OWNERS!

I'm primarily interested in this for its wireless internet capabilities. Can you access gmail over whispernet? google maps? Whats the internet like overall?

Most importantly, CAN I WOOT FROM A KINDLE?!

Yes you can ... Set gmail to HTML mode and it works ... a little painful viewing your inbox and navigating but it works

i hope they do it again. >_<

The discounted kindle is a nice start, but what would really make this whole partnership worthwhile is to be able to attach my woot account to my amazon wallet and take advantage of amazon prime shipping.

Please tell me this is in the works, woot!

devcon wrote:How bout a Kindle "O" Crap...

IT ALREADY IS!!!!

moonphrogg wrote:The discounted kindle is a nice start, but what would really make this whole partnership worthwhile is to be able to attach my woot account to my amazon wallet and take advantage of amazon prime shipping.

Please tell me this is in the works, woot!

HELL NO!!!

shipping 5$ always...please do not change that W00T!!! Thats one of the best features of your wonderful site!

Toynbert wrote:oooh, book.woot. or media.woot I like it.

This might actually be a good idea for Amazon, who has a somewhat contentious relationship with publishers at the moment. Offer 1 NY Times bestseller a day at $7.99 instead of $9.99. Amazon gets the added attention of having cheaper books, and even though it's at a reduced profit, the publishers know that they get to move a lot of copies at once.

Amazon, get on it.

bunions show 4,968 sold.
My guess is they got an even 5,000 from the new overlords, and either there are 32 woot employees each holding their own new Kindle, or we may see a couple of these in the next BOCs. (BsOC?)

I'm expecting a seriously badass WootOff with even badasser Burnt Orange Champions (Hookem!) coming up very soon.

I like mine. vast (and increasable)storage, note taking, a rudimentary browser, included dictionary, Amazon cheap-o/free downloadable classics. And mine is an old one.

crowsnest wrote:HELL NO!!!

shipping 5$ always...please do not change that W00T!!! Thats one of the best features of your wonderful site!

Keep the $5 regular shipping, but let Amazon Prime members use their free 2-day shipping option. And definitely allow us to link accounts, so we only have to update payment information in one place for both sites.

Woot! selling out to the man. Goodbye. It was fun while it lasted.

My wife really likes hers. She's always toting it around with here, so I'll sing her the "My Little Kindle" song (to the tune of My Little Pony) or the "My Kindle and Me" song (to the tune of My Buddy/Kid Sister).

For some reason, she doesn't like my performances while she's trying to read though...

Also, there is now a Kindle app for android! Neato, mang!

KG4ONJ wrote:E-Readers make PERFECT sense. Consider eye strain - when it comes to reading something on an electronic display the backlight makes the task of reading for long periods of time very hard on the eyes. To me there's a big difference between the reading I do on the computer and the reading I do with a book. With a book I'm constantly focused on the page whereas with my computer I'm looking at the screen, the keyboard, the pile of papers on my desk, my cat sticking her paws in my drink, etc. etc. It makes me batty and my head hurt a little when I intensely stare at my screen for more than 5-6 minutes at a Wiki article that someone made up (try it yourself).

Anyway, the non-backlit E-Ink screen takes care of all that. I have had my Kindle for 6 months and it is easily the best electronic thing I own. I take it everywhere and find myself reading 3-4 times as much as I used to. Anytime I have a few extra minutes I pull it out and start reading.

It's not meant to be a computer or a wireless internet device, just a device to read books on which it does very, very well in my opinion.

I couldn't agree more. I have a Kindle and an iPad with the Kindle app installed. One would think that it would make no sense for me to keep both devices, but for all the reasons you've listed, I find myself putting down the iPad and picking up the Kindle when I want to read more than a few pages. But the really cool thing is that Whispersync keeps the two devices synced, even down to what page I'm on in the book I'm reading. If I read 5 pages on my iPad, then pick up my Kindle, the Kindle will ask me if I want to go to the same page I was turned to on the iPad.

There you go Amazon, leverage that new purchase to unload those Kindels you can no longer sell at the prices you want... I smell a price drop on its way folks!

crowsnest wrote:HELL NO!!!

shipping 5$ always...please do not change that W00T!!! Thats one of the best features of your wonderful site!

Shipping costs are subjective. $10 item with free shipping, $5 item with $5 shipping or $1 item with $9 shipping will in the end cost you $10. I hope everyone realizes that discounted, flat-rate, or 'free' shipping is just a marketing gimmick, and real shipping costs in such cases are included in the item price.

Anyways, how long before we see Woot! Monkeys in Amazon's Gold Box deals?

My thoughts:

Please don't take away PayPal. That is my only dislike of Amazon.

Better Woot-Offs???

Sellout.Woot now goes to Amazon Lightining?

Amazon Lightining/Gold Box turns into Woot...

More good products, less Excalibur.

Kinda sad I missed this, but then again, I might not have gotten it anyways. I am very attracted to the idea of the Kindle, *especially* since I have a bunch of travel lined up for the next few months, but what I want to see is some way of having the books I already own put on there without me needing to buy all of them again (since I have ~600 books or so sitting on my shelves at home, repurchasing them in an electronic format would be cost prohibitive).

I'd also definitely be on board if there was some way for newly bought physical books to have some kind of code or something that would let you download an e-version. Essentially, I only want to pay for content once.

For now, at least, I'm too attached to the chopped-down-tree versions that I've grown used to, so I guess it's OK that I missed out on this woot.

Right after I saw this deal open I was going to buy one but I stopped at the last minute. Here is why I did not buy the deal.

I have to put a new roof on my house so cash is tight. I could have bought this from amazon, no tax, and free prime shipping, for $189. I buy a lot of stuff from amazon so at this point I basically get free shipping.

The kindle deal last time from Woot was $149 + tax and shipping totaled about $169 so to save $20 on technology that will change on the marketplace soon was not enough to push the button last night.

If this deal had of been no tax and prime shipping last night I would have bought, at a real total of $149.

So I thought amazon/woot would like to know why I didn't buy. I will just have to wait to buy a reader after I pay for the new roof and see what is out there even if I have to pay $20 more at that time for the same thing.

JerryLees wrote:There you go Amazon, leverage that new purchase to unload those Kindels you can no longer sell at the prices you want... I smell a price drop on its way folks!

I don't think it's that simple, or they wouldn't be sold out. True, we have recently seen, and will continue to see price drops in the competing ereaders.

But I think Amazon also wanted to give something to the Wooters (to keep us here), and to make some noise about its new acquisition (to further popularize both the Kindle and Woot).

Let's hope the new owner keeps Woot fun (Matt Rutledge will still be here), and also offers even better deals.

p.s. if anyone gets $10 million in your Bowl of Cereal, please let us know in the forums.

Don't get a Kindle. Not only does it have a proprietary format, it also doesn't read a lot of other formats. In addition, Amazon retains control of these devices wirelessly, and can remove ebooks you've purchased without notice or permission. (They did this a while back to none other than Orwell's 1984, of all books.)

Get one of the other ereaders that can take on multiple formats, especially Adobe DRM'd epubs, which are pretty much standard for most ebooks other than those at Amazon. On all the other readers, whatever you put on there *stays* on there until and unless *you* delete it.

kaosengel wrote:Don't get a Kindle. Not only does it have a proprietary format, it also doesn't read a lot of other formats. In addition, Amazon retains control of these devices wirelessly, and can remove ebooks you've purchased without notice or permission. (They did this a while back to none other than Orwell's 1984, of all books.)

Get one of the other ereaders that can take on multiple formats, especially Adobe DRM'd epubs, which are pretty much standard for most ebooks other than those at Amazon. On all the other readers, whatever you put on there *stays* on there until and unless *you* delete it.

You can convert just about any non-DRM'ed ebook with Calibre or another program.

It is never too early to start ordering the free books at Amazon. You can register your Kindle to the account upon delivery. As a K1 owner, the new ability to password protect the K2 is fabulous. (Horndogs will be happy to note that there are lots of free erotica selections at Amazon right now.) Its one of those things you may want to check frequently. There's a link to the top 100 paid and free books on Amazon's Kindle Store front page.

Don't forget the free selections at Baen Books!


edited to add:

You may want to set up a "kindle" account that is separate from your regular buying account so that your "free" selections don't mess up your Amazon recommendations.

I hope Amazon reinvigorates woot. The site has basically s@cked for a few years.

lostinplace wrote:You may want to set up a "kindle" account that is separate from your regular buying account so that your "free" selections don't mess up your Amazon recommendations.

heh.

Good thoughts. Both on getting free books NOW and perhaps setting up a separate kindle account in general.

How many were REALLY available? 10?

kaosengel wrote:Don't get a Kindle. Not only does it have a proprietary format,

True. The Amazon ebook store does use a proprietary DRM & file format. This is a problem because.......?

kaosengel wrote:it also doesn't read a lot of other formats.

False. I have my Kindle comfortably fed with material from a LOT of places, both free and paid. True, Whispernet purchases only go to Amazon, but it's not that hard to hook Kindle up to your computer and feed it other material. And I don't personally find it all that egregious to buy from Amazon.

kaosengel wrote:In addition, Amazon retains control of these devices wirelessly, and can remove ebooks you've purchased without notice or permission. (They did this a while back to none other than Orwell's 1984, of all books.)

Yes, we all know the story. Big Brother squashing a book about Big Brother. The irony drips, yadda yadda yadda.

Stuff happens. Life moves on. You might also note that this was an isolated incident? Care to cite some other example?

kaosengel wrote:On all the other readers, whatever you put on there *stays* on there until and unless *you* delete it.

Like I said, mine's comfortably fed from multiple sources, and nothing's vanished yet. Methinks thou doth protest too much.

dgscapin wrote:How many were REALLY available? 10?

Well, it says there were 4968 woots, and 100% bought 1, so.....

Damn you, bed! Made me sleep late and miss teh Kindle!

So sad that Woot won't be able to celebrate their 6th birthday, which would have been this month. You will live on in our hearts.

This seems to be related to Amazon's purchase of Woot. I certainly hope that Amazon doesn't see this venue as an opportunity to peddle stuff off its own website..

Thanks for the tip about www.skweezer.com. Will make mobile surfing much better!

tscottme wrote:Yes and no. Some complicated web pages may not load properly. You cannot watch vide clips or listen to audio clips. I read several of my favortire news and blog web pages every day on the Kindle. Pages load slower than "real" internet connections but it's free and mobile.

I use www.skweezer.com to simplify the web pages for mobile devices. Skweezer can strip out pics and ads and deliver the web content faster. I'm a politics, news, history nerd so my web surfing is mostly long form text pages. The Kindle is awesome for this since there is no monthly fee or contract for wireless connection.

You can bookmark web pages on your Kindle, just like on your PC web browser. Typing isn't very nice because keys are very small and the key lables are small and a bit dim to my 45 year old eyes. You can also make the text size larger or smaller to make it easier to read or to get more content per page.

woot sold out to the man..how disappointing..

gosh darn,misssed it again.

brycebowman wrote:This seems to be related to Amazon's purchase of Woot. I certainly hope that Amazon doesn't see this venue as an opportunity to peddle stuff off its own website..

You know, I kind of had this same reaction earlier, see my post on page 14 or 15... But thinking about it rationally, I buy a lot of stuff from Amazon and if I can get something occasionally from Woot for a 25% discount, what's the problem? It's not like there's some drastic change in how Woot does business, here. While they present an irreverent front to the public, they're obviously well organized and on top of things or else they wouldn't have managed to succeed in the marketplace as well as they have.

Seriously, Woot has never NOT been a commercial entity; they just basically hit the jackpot for startups: do something uniquely well and get noticed by a big company, play your position in the market as leverage for a deal. This is a huge win for Woot. I don't want to see proprietary Amazon stuff every day, but I'll be glad to see some variety and, perhaps, higher average quality thanks to the new association.

bought a kindle 1.0 in the first month and was hooked. i now have a 2.0 and wife has my old one. perfect time to upgrade.

You will buy more books, because it is so easy, so make room in the budget. also feedbooks and other sites are wondeful for getting back in touch with those old classics that you were supposed to read in HS but never did.

this has also become the primary device at our school for quick research on the debate team (in addition to myself, there are 2 others on the team). The quicklink lookup to google and wikipedia as well as the scroll over a word dictionary make it wonderful for finding out obscure things quickly.

I really don't understand why a respectable company like Amazon would want anything to do with an adolescent company like Woot!...

duker88888 wrote:I would BET this is being shipped directly from Amazon from their stock and Amazon does not use the infamous smart post :-))

That's where you are wrong! When you order from Amazon and they give you a USPS tracking number and then say that it will be three days until you see further information, your order is being shipped Smart Post. If you enter the tracking number in FedEx tracking you will find complete shipping info.

4968 Kindles sold eh? I wonder how many Kindle-less employees there were at the Woot! offices before yesterday. WAS IT 32?!?!?! ;)

fldeals wrote:Ha! We knew it! Amazon merchandise on day one!

Yep!

Amazon buys Woot and the first thing they sell is a kindle. Go figure.

sold out, indeed